Hokey pokey is a flavour of ice cream in New Zealand consisting of plain vanilla ice cream with small, solid 8️⃣ lumps of honeycomb toffee. Hokey pokey is the New Zealand term for honeycomb toffee.[2][3][4][5] The original recipe until around 1980 8️⃣ consisted of solid toffee, but in a marketing change, Tip Top decided to use small balls of honeycomb toffee instead.
It 8️⃣ is the second-most popular ice cream flavour behind vanilla in New Zealand,[6] and is a frequently cited example of Kiwiana.[7] 8️⃣ It is also exported to Japan, Australia, and the Pacific Islands.[8]
Origins and etymology [ edit ]
The term hokey pokey has 8️⃣ been used in reference to honeycomb toffee in New Zealand since the late 19th century. The origin of this term, 8️⃣ in reference to honeycomb specifically, is not known with certainty, and it is not until the mid-20th century that hokey 8️⃣ pokey ice cream was created.[citation needed]
Coincidentally, "hokey pokey" was a slang term for ice cream in general in the 19th 8️⃣ and early 20th centuries in several areas — including New York City[9] and parts of Great Britain — specifically for 8️⃣ the ice cream sold by street vendors or "hokey pokey men". The vendors, said to be mostly of Italian descent, 8️⃣ supposedly used a sales pitch or song involving the phrase "hokey pokey", for which several origins have been suggested. One 8️⃣ such song in use in 1930s Liverpool was "Hokey pokey penny a lump, that's the stuff to make ye jump".[10]